Saturday, September 23, 2006

USATODAY.com - Group says video shows U.S. soldiers' bodies being burned: "Group says video shows U.S. soldiers' bodies being burnedUpdated 9/23/2006 9:59 PM ET E-mail | Save | Print | Subscribe to stories like this Subscribe to stories like thisCAIRO (AP) — An al-Qaeda-linked group posted a Web video Saturday purporting to show the bodies of two American soldiers being dragged behind a truck, then set on fire in apparent retaliation for the alleged rape-slaying of a young Iraqi woman by U.S. troops from the same unit.

The Mujahedeen Shura Council — an umbrella organization of insurgent groups, including al-Qaeda in Iraq — posted a previous video in June showing the soldiers' mutilated bodies, and claiming it killed them. It was not clear whether Saturday's video was a continuation of that footage, or why it was released.

The new footage came hours after the posting of another al-Qaeda video, an apparent re-release of a tape showing the execution of a Turkish hostage — by the man purported to be the new leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq.

The images would be the first of Abu Ayyub al-Masri to be released since the group announced that he had succeeded Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who was killed by a U.S. airstrike in Iraq on June 7.

Both videos appeared just as Sunni Arabs in Iraq began Ramadan, the Islamic holy month. "